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British guitarist Adrian Legg released his last album Inheritance in the fall of 2004. It was a lovely mash-up of ambient blues, shuffles, jigs and waltzes treated with ornamental guitar effects thereby stretching the bounds of what it means to enjoy an instrumental solo guitar album.

Then for a while, that was it. Legg continued to tour but updates that divulged a possible follow-up album were few and far between. Leggheads everywhere can rest easy now for Adrian has finally unleashed Slow Guitar, a self-released affair featuring 13 tracks. All of them appear to be rerecorded versions of songs from Legg’s back catalog (though I must be missing the album that originally contained “Karen”). And seeing as how Adrian Legg’s effects pedal board had been growing over the years, jiggering his sound beyond the confines of a simple electric-acoustic guitar, these reinterpretations stand to go a long way. I myself look forward to hearing another rendition of the note-perfect piece “Mrs. Jack’s Last Stand”.

Usually, Kuala Lumpur is predictably sweltering and humid with the occasional rainstorm to break the monotony. Over Christmas and New Year, however, we had grey skies, rain, and a strange new chill in the air brought on by a slight dip in temperatures. It seemed only prudent to hunker down to some hard work and the ‘80s-era TV adaptations of Dorothy L. Sayers’ mystery novels available on YouTube. Particularly, Gaudy Night, which I enjoyed in book-form and also in its visual adaptation. Edward Petherbridge hits all the right notes as the impossibly fair-haired and monocled Lord Peter Wimsey, prone to yes, whimsy and English excess, and capable of being endearing, compelling, and annoying all at once. Harriet Walters also plays Harriet Vane just as I imagined Harriet Vane to be: intelligent, also mildly annoying, and seething with an undercurrent of anger and proper English passion.

The cloistered all-female colleges of Oxford provide opportunities for plenty of scholarly women to wax lyrical over Socrates, morality, and human nature. There are stereotypical assumptions on female intelligence and sexuality, as well as the unpleasant whiff of distinct class snobbery – the latter being a common trait in Sayers’ novels and British mysteries of the particular era. However, the performances of the actors manage to inject nuance into what is “just” a mystery story (albeit a very compelling one). Furthermore, in the midst of 21st century bad weather and general disenchantment with the new year, the utterly inexplicable and anachronistic yet very apt romance between Peter Wimsey and Harriet Vane allow our jaded but still quietly-romantic hearts to keep on beating in hope for our real-life infatuations.

by PopMatters Staff

Mobile, Alabama’s the Sunshine Factory are a power trio with a shoegaze and psychedelic edge. It’s a popular sound in indie these days with Bear in Heaven and A Place to Bury Strangers as the artists closest to Sunshine Factory’s approach. Last December, the band released their latest LP Sugar and today we present the premiere of their newest video, “Twisted and Clover”, full of slabs of their trademark fuzzy, distortion-fueled pop. Check below the jump for the group’s upcoming your dates.

The news yesterday that neo-psychedelic chanteuse Trish Keenan, founding member of Broadcast, had been hospitalized for pneumonia was troubling, but it might not have seemed nearly serious enough. According to a press release from Warp Records, Keenan died in the hospital on Friday morning.

It is with great sadness we announce that Trish Keenan from Broadcast passed away at 9am this morning in hospital. She died from complications with pneumonia after battling the illness for two weeks in intensive care.

Our thoughts go out to James, Martin, her friends and her family and we request that the public respect their wishes for privacy at this time.

This is an untimely tragic loss and we will miss Trish dearly—a unique voice, an extraordinary talent and a beautiful human being. Rest in Peace. - Warp Records